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PRESENTED BY 



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MEMOIR 



Charles Burroughs, D.D.. 



PREPARED FOR 



SHje Nefa Pfampsfn're historical Soctetg, 



BY 

ANDREW P. PEABODY. 



CAMBRIDGE : 

PRESS OF JOHN WILSON AND SON. 
1871. 






Gift 

Miss M. C. Codmsn 

March 1914 



MEMOIR 



CHARLES BURROUGHS, D.D. 



r^HARLES BURROUGHS, the fourth 
child and son of George and Mary 
(Fullerton) Burroughs, was born in Boston, 
on the 27th of December, 1787. His early 
boyhood was passed chiefly in Boston; in 
part, however, at Billerica, under the tuition 
of the then eminent teacher Dr. Pemberton, 
of whom he always spoke with reverence 
and affection. He received important aid 
and encouragement in his literary culture 
from his pastor, Rev. Dr. Gardiner, Rector 
of Trinity Church, w r ho had been educated 
in England, and had there been trained to a 



more critical scholarship than had become 
naturalized in our own institutions of learn- 
ing. The influence of a man of so high and 
varied accomplishments found a genial re- 
ception with his young parishioner, who, 
through his whole life, was accustomed to 
ascribe his love of letters and his conver- 
sance with the classics to this early intimacy. 
In 1802 young Burroughs entered Harvard 
College. Among his surviving classmates 
are the venerable and eminent Dr. Jacob 
Bigelow and Dr. Cogswell, the latter well 
known for his services in establishing the 
Astor Library, — the worthy consummation 
of a life consecrated with the utmost single- 
ness of purpose to the advancement of 
knowledge; and of the deceased members 
of the class, among other honored names, we 
may specify those of Alexander H. Everett, 
Daniel Oliver, the distinguished medical pro- 
fessor and lecturer, and William Pitt Preble, 



5 



who held high offices both judicial and diplo- 
matic. Burroughs is represented by his coe- 
vals in college as having had great personal 
beauty, winning manners, and the most ami- 
able disposition. He maintained a character 
free not only from gross stain, but from the 
charge even of juvenile indiscretion. He 
was not regarded as a hard student, but was 
known to employ a large portion of his time 
in reading, and to have become, during his 
college life, well grounded in elegant litera- 
ture both ancient and modern. At the same 
time it is manifest that he could not have 
neglected his college work; for, having de- 
livered on taking his first degree a poem 
(which by the usage of the times indicated 
not rank, but mere verse-making capacity), 
on receiving his Master's degree he delivered 
the Latin Valedictory, which was wont to 
be assigned only to one who had been a very 
high scholar in college. 



After leaving college, Mr. Burroughs pur- 
sued the study of theology with Dr. Gardiner, 
who, in addition to his literary attainments, 
had no little reputation as a reader and a pul- 
pit orator. Dr. Gardiner's reading is said to 
have been pre-eminently graphic, so that, if 
the lesson of the day were narrative or de- 
scriptive, his hearers almost fancied that they 
saw what they heard. Accustomed from 
infancy to this style of reading, Mr. Bur- 
roughs insensibly grew into it; and it was 
but one of the many prestiges of success 
with which he entered on his profession. 

On Christmas Eve, 1806, St. John's (Epis- 
copal) Church in Portsmouth was destroyed 
by fire. The parish worshipping in it — 
whose history, through some periods of sus- 
pended animation, may be traced back to 
the early part of the seventeenth century — 
had become enfeebled under a rector who 
had failed to secure the entire respect and 



confidence of his congregation, and who had 
resigned his charge at the preceding Easter. 
New Hampshire was not then within the 
limits of any diocese, and the Episcopalians 
of that day were much less rigid than those 
of our own time in adherence to rubric and 
canon. After the burning of the church, 
the congregation, destitute of both shepherd 
and fold, united with one of the Congrega- 
tional churches of the town then without a 
pastor ; having the use of their house of 
worship on Sunday afternoons, and generally 
employing their preacher for the morning to 
read the evening service and accompany it 
with a sermon. Meanwhile the citizens of 
the town contributed with great promptness 
and munificence toward the erection of a 
new church, which was completed in 1808, 
and at the opening of which for public 
worship — not technically the consecration, 
which did not take place till nearly half a 



8 



century afterward — the devotional services 
were conducted by the young pastor of the 
hospitable Congregationalists. But with the 
new edifice it was fitting to introduce an era 
of canonical conformity. There were, how- 
ever, very few men in holy orders, who had 
not parochial charges of their own. Mr. 
Burroughs, a candidate for orders, was there- 
fore sent to Portsmouth ad interim, as a 
reader. It was understood that, while he 
had not authority to perform certain clerical 
functions, and was not termed a preacher, it 
was lawful for him to read sermons of his 
own composition. Both as a reader and as 
a writer, he gave entire satisfaction to the 
members of the parish, and drew to the new 
church not a few from other congregations, 
who w r ere willing to remain if they might 
enjoy his ministrations. At the same time, 
his social qualities commended him equally 
to persons of taste and refinement and to 



those of plain and simple habits. A gentle- 
man by gift of nature no less than by oppor- 
tunity and culture, and at the same time full 
of kindness and mainly solicitous to do good, 
feeling neither beneath the highest nor above 
the humblest, he won the sincere regard and 
cordial esteem of all with whom he was 
brought into relation; and the consequence 
of his transient ministry was an invitation to 
become Rector of St. John's Church. He 
accepted the invitation; but continued his 
services as a mere reader for more than a 
year. There was then no bishop of Massa- 
chusetts, and the Eastern Diocese had not 
yet been formed. It was probably this state 
of things which led to the delay of Mr. 
Burroughs's ordination. He received dea- 
con's orders at Philadelphia, at the hands of 
the venerable Bishop White, on the ioth of 
December, 1809. At this time he spent 
several weeks in Philadelphia; and, as we 



IO 



have learned from his classmate Dr. Bigelow, 
then a medical student in that city, was 
warmly welcomed in society, and much ad- 
mired as a preacher. On May 20, 1812, 
he was ordained priest, at Portsmouth, by 
Bishop Griswold, who had been but recently 
consecrated as first bishop of the Eastern 
Diocese; and on the next day he was in due 
form instituted by that prelate in the rector- 
ship which he had virtually held for three or 
four years. 

At the time of Mr. Burroughs's settlement, 
Portsmouth was the residence of a large 
number of distinguished men, many of whom 
were his parishioners, and others his friends. 
He was at one time a fellow-boarder with 
Daniel Webster, and formed then an inti- 
macy with him which lasted through Mr. 
Webster's life. The late Jeremiah Mason 
attended his church, — a keenly critical, yet 
kindly listener. Among the younger men 



II 



of culture there was a marked development 
of literary taste and ability, and Mr. Bur- 
roughs was one of the foremost in the study 
of the classics and other kindred pursuits, 
always ready to assume the post of service 
and of labor, and to prepare smooth paths 
for feet less experienced than his own. 

During Dr. Burroughs's pastorate the ex- 
ternal events were few. On April 8, 1823, 
he was married to Ann Rindge Peirce 
(daughter of John Peirce, an eminent mer- 
chant of Portsmouth), whose devoted love 
made his home happy, gave its holy min- 
istries to his days of decline and infirmity, 
and guards his memory as the most sacred 
and precious of trusts. About ten years after- 
ward he purchased the magnificent mansion- 
house erected by Governor Langdon in 1784, 
and occupied by him till his death. Here 
Dr. Burroughs was able to exercise the 
ample and elegant hospitality in which he 



12 



rejoiced, and to surround himself with ob- 
jects of taste, works of art, and the books 
he best loved. The very large drawing- 
room became at once his library and his 
reception-room, and one could seldom call 
upon him without finding on his library-table 
some object of fresh interest, — book, en- 
graving, flower, antiquity, or novelty. For 
many years he enjoyed uninterrupted health; 
yet at a comparatively early period his voice 
became somewhat impaired in compass and 
power, indicating a tendency to bronchitis, 
of which he had two or three severe attacks 
in the latter years of his ministry. In con- 
sequence of the interruption to his public ser- 
vices occasioned by these repeated illnesses, 
and of a growing liableness to exhausting 
fatigue when in full duty, he, without any 
formal arrangement with his parish, em- 
ployed in succession several stated assist- 
ants. At length, in 1857, he resigned his 



*3 

pastorate, and declined to reconsider his 
action, though invited so to do by the unani- 
mous vote of the church. 

A life barren of incidents, and with but 
few marked dates, is often for this only the 
more abundant in its beneficent activity and 
the richer in its enduring fruits. Thus was 
it with the long and peaceful pastorate whose 
history we have told in so few words. We 
will now, from our intimate knowledge of 
him for thirty-five years, endeavor to convey 
our impressions of his character and his ser- 
vices as a man, a minister, and a citizen. 

He had by inheritance a nature finely 
toned. His sensibilities were delicate and 
keen; his tastes pure; his standard of honor 
high; his sense of right prompt, discriminat- 
ing, and exacting. We cannot conceive of 
his ever having uttered a word or committed 
an act inconsistent with that most noble 
style of manhood, the Christian gentleman. 



H 

Courtesy, urbanity, and kindness in all the 
intercourse of life were less with him a habit 
than a necessity. His recoil from all that 
was coarse and rude was more like the in- 
stinctive shrinking of the sensitive plant than 
the conscious repellency of one who has had 
tendencies of that sort to resist, or corre- 
sponding habits to reform, in his own person. 
His gentle dignity and unstudied grace of 
speech and manners warded oft the rough 
contacts which most men encounter, w T on 
for him an easy way among all sorts and 
conditions of people, brought out what was 
best in them in their intercourse with him, 
and thus often made his opinions of men 
better than they deserved; for there were 
those whom he thought he knew intimately 
who never revealed to him aspects of their 
character well known to all beside. But his 
moral indignation, when aroused, was in- 
tensely strong; and while he was the enemy 



*5 

of none, his disesteem, when he once saw 
reason for it, was emphatic, profound, and 
irrevocable. 

His conversational gifts were of a very 
high order. His power of description, racy 
anecdote, and entertaining narrative gave a 
rich zest to his liberal hospitality, and made 
him a welcome guest in every circle. On 
higher themes he often rose into a spontane- 
ous eloquence, which was never surpassed 
in his best written discourses, and seldom in 
those impromptu addresses on occasions of 
public interest or sacred moment, when 
his friends depended on him for the most 
stirring and efficient utterances that ever fell 
from his lips. His fluency of address, with 
his warm sympathy, rendered him pre-emi- 
nently a K son of consolation w among the 
afflicted, whose burdens and sorrows he 
made his own, and to whom he ministered 
with an assiduity that taxed even the strength 



i6 



of his most vigorous days, and that was still 
unremitted when growing years and infirmi- 
ties might well have sought relief from duties 
so onerous. 

He was through life a diligent student and 
a zealous reader. He was well versed in 
the classics, and familiar especially with the 
best Latin writers; and few men have been 
more conversant with early English litera- 
ture, in prose and poetry, sacred and secular. 
He was a good Hebrew scholar, and inde- 
fatigable in the study of Biblical criticism, as 
also in the history, standard authorities, and 
expository and apologetic literature of his 
own Church. He was, however, somewhat 
distrustful of new views in whatever apper- 
tained to theology or Biblical science, and 
reluctant to admit aught not consecrated by 
venerable antiquity. He had formed his 
opinions on essential subjects deliberately, 
with diligent research, and with the aid of 



VI 

the best authorities of his time, and not un- 
naturally he was unwilling to disturb convic- 
tions which in him were identified with his 
best thought and his highest life. He knew 
well that many of the guests that might have 
claimed his mental hospitality were any thing 
but angels, and he was not disposed to open 
the door to the rabble of novel speculations 
in the doubtful chance of receiving " angels 
unawares." 

In his chosen profession he was evidently 
inspired, energized, and guided by the sin- 
cerest piety. A sacred sense of divine veri- 
ties, a conscious nearness to the eternal 
Father, a reverential and tender love for 
the Saviour, a felt dependence on heavenly 
strength and grace, a consecration of his 
whole being to the work given him to do, 
and a vivid and realizing view of the unseen 
world, were with him the fountain of life 
and of joy. Never ostentatious in religious 



i8 



profession or utterance, abhorring sanctimony 
and cant, deeming the obtruding of sacred 
themes on irrelevant occasions but the cast- 
ing of pearls before swine, he yet had always 
the air and manner that indicated high com- 
munings and chastened views of all things 
earthly; and he suffered no fit occasion to 
pass without the fervent utterance of his 
convictions and feelings as a Christian. At 
the same time he did honor to his faith by a 
sanctity of life beyond reproach or cavil, by 
untiring vigilance in his sacred calling, and 
by a charity and philanthropy which were 
always open to every rightful claim. 

In his work as a preacher of the Gospel, 
his diligence would compare well with that 
of the " painful " preachers of earlier fame. 
Few men have written so many sermons, 
and with so faithful labor. His sermons 
were pre-eminently evangelical, — on the 
great themes of repentance, faith, and Chris- 



19 

tian righteousness, — earnest in appeal, faith- 
ful in rebuke. He preached not the Church, 
but its Head. A careful observer of the 
ecclesiastical holy days, he made them occa- 
sions not for the glorification of the Church, 
but for the exhibition of the Redeemer's 
love, cross, power, and glory. His style was 
conformed, not by imitation, but by long fa- 
miliarity, to the best earlier English models, 
— copious, fervent, rhythmical, less concise, 
indeed, than if he had taken the Latin clas- 
sics for his standard, but in its redundancy 
always the outflow of a full mind and heart. 
His sermons were methodical in their 
structure and arrangement, their divisions 
exhausting, and the transitions distinctly 
marked. If they had any fault, it was that of 
excessive fulness. He seemed unwilling to 
omit any portion of a large subject, or any of 
the accessory thoughts or illustrations that 
crowded his own mind during the season of 



20 



composition; and his fertility on his favor- 
ite themes seemed exhaustless. Thus he 
never repeated a Christmas sermon. We 
heard in succession more than twenty of 
those sermons, always appropriate, yet al- 
ways on a new aspect of the great miracle 
of that day. His delivery was earnest, 
rapid, strongly emotional, in the earlier years 
of his ministry impressively eloquent, and 
after the partial failure of his voice still 
effective, and never losing its charm to ac- 
customed ears. But the discourses that are 
most fondly remembered are those of his 
lecture-room and chapel, — extemporaneous 
in form, yet always the result of the most 
faithful study. He completed on these occa- 
sions what few have done, — the exposi- 
tion of the entire Scriptures, Hebrew and 
Christian. He went over the whole ground 
in careful preparation, with the record in the 
original before him, and surrounded by the 



21 



commentators whom he trusted and loved, 
— not always those whom younger divines 
would have chosen, but those who had been 
revered as oracles in his earlier clays, and 
from whose works have been drawn, often 
without the ceremony of quotation, many of 
the best materials to which later expositors 
owe their fame. On these occasions, freed 
from the incumbrance of notes, his naturally 
rich and fluent oratory found full scope. 
In the glow of his own devout feeling he 
found in the Divine Word nothing barren or 
unfruitful. His adoring thought outstripped, 
while it inspired, his rapt utterance; and 
those who best loved his written sermons 
felt that they were listening, at these in- 
formal services, to a far higher order of 
thought and diction, — that the preacher had 
grown into the prophet, the didactic out- 
bloomed into the lyric. 

Dr. Burroughs's fidelity as a preacher did 



22 

not make him forgetful of his pastoral duty. 
At home in all the homes of his flock, he 
was especially so in those of the afflicted, 
the aged, and the poor. Wherever there 
was specific need of his services, they were 
rendered with such tenderness and perse- 
verance, with such an affluence of cheering 
words and offices of saintly love, that to 
many hearts his presence and his name were 
identified with all that is most sacred in 
earth and heaven. Possessed of ample abil- 
ity, he was bountiful, yet judicious, in his 
charity to the poor; especially to those who 
had seen better days, and were reluctant to 
bear any external badge of pauperism. It is 
not easy to overestimate the number of 
women and families of this class who were 
enabled to maintain their self-respect unim- 
paired, and to subsist in apparent comfort 
on very scanty property of their own, through 
resources furnished directly by him, or made 



23 



availing by his agency. He found for them 
the means of helping themselves, and when 
those means fell short he supplied the de- 
ficiency. 

Dr. Burroughs's ecclesiastical position and 
relations claim our distinct notice. His 
was the oldest and long the only Episcopal 
church in New Hampshire, and during the 
greater part of his ministry the only one 
capable of exerting an influence beyond its 
own borders; and this church, as we have 
intimated, though essentially strong, was 
greatly enfeebled at the time of his settle- 
ment, but was nourished, largely through 
his efforts and sacrifices, into more than its 
previous vigor and prosperity. Whenever 
there was any extraordinary demand for 
repairs or improvements, he was foremost 
among the contributors; and in all church 
charities he took the lead. For many years 
he was the representative man of the Epis- 



2 4 

copal Church in New Hampshire, and his 
services were freely given wherever it 
seemed expedient to gather new congrega- 
tions. He was prominent as an officer of 
the State Convention, and for nearly the 
whole of his ministry was always elected as 
a delegate to the Triennial General Conven- 
tion, in whose proceedings he uniformly bore 
an active and influential part. He believed in 
his own Church, and loved it. He had been 
trained in the conviction, confirmed by his 
careful study, that its ministry was founded 
on apostolic tradition, and in accordance 
with the practice of the Primitive Church. 
He delighted in its services, was unwilling 
ever to omit or curtail them, and rejoiced in 
every opportunity for their use. 

But, while a devoted churchman, — a high 
churchman he would have called himself by 
the standard of his earlier days, — he main- 
tained the most genial and generous relations 



25 

of friendship and intercourse with clergymen 
and churches of other denominations. He 
adhered to the canons of his Church even in 
their exclusiveness; but to those which lim- 
ited his Christian fellowship he crave the 
most literal construction which they would 
bear, while he obeyed all the rest in spirit as 
in letter. They forbade his inviting other 
than Episcopal ministers to officiate in his 
own church on stated occasions of public 
worship, and he submitted to the restriction; 
but, on all occasions and in all places not 
included in this rule, he deemed it a privi- 
lege to unite in religious services with other 
ministers of the Gospel. He freely accepted 
invitations to officiate for them and with 
them in their churches, and after his resigna- 
tion of his own charge he was always ready 
to fill their places in case of sickness or 
necessary absence, scrupulously asking — as 
he was canonically bound to do — in every 



26 



instance the leave of his young successor, 
and not a little indignant when that leave 
was accompanied with an expression of dis- 
approval. On other than the regular occa- 
sions of religious service he was a frequent 
attendant at the churches of his clerical 
brethren, and they and their congregations 
always felt that they had the most cordial 
welcome in his church. He deemed the 
Lord's Supper a common feast of love for 
all Christians, and cordially invited to it all 
the disciples of Christ without reference to 
their ecclesiastical relations. At his Christ- 
mas service and communion it was not un- 
common to see almost all the clergymen of 
the city, and nearly as many communicants 
from other congregations as from his own. 
In his kindnesses and charities he was equally 
broad. When he knew of a case of poverty, 
he considered it as within his charge, what- 
ever the sufferer's church or creed j and for 



27 



counsel, and for friendly offices of all descrip- 
tions, he was freely resorted -to by persons 
of every variety of faith and ritual. 

With this spirit he was, of course, more 
than the minister of a parish: he was a 
foremost — in many regards and for a long 
period the foremost — citizen of Portsmouth. 
For many years he was Chairman of the 
School Committee, and was always an effi- 
cient helper in movements for the advance- 
ment of educational interests. He was 
influential in the establishment, active in the 
administration, and for several successive 
years the President (we believe the first 
President), of the Howard Benevolent So- 
ciety, — a pioneer institution, which, so far 
as we know, initiated the plan now generally 
adopted of dividing a town or city, for the 
relief or prevention of pauperism, into dis- 
tricts, each under the charge of its own 
committee, and furnishing the specific sup- 



28 



plies found to be needed on personal visita- 
tion. He was the second President of the 
Portsmouth Athenaeum, and during his long 
administration contributed far more than any, 
we might almost say than all, other persons 
to its growth from small beginnings into an 
institution that is equally an ornament to 
the city and an essential means of high 
literary culture to the community. In fine, 
he was always relied upon, and never in 
vain, for his voice or pen, his liberal contri- 
butions or active services, in every plan for 
the public improvement; and it would be 
difficult to recall any movement or institu- 
tion of that kind, in the city of his residence, 
with which his name is not more or less 
associated. 

In various State institutions he also held a 
prominent place. The members of the New 
Hampshire Historical Society need not be 
informed of his long official relation to their 



2 9 

body, of his efficient charge of its interests, 
and of his unique and inestimable essay, 
printed in its Transactions, on the necessity 
and the methods of securing the preserva- 
tion of public documents. He was early 
interested in the needs and sufferings of the 
insane, and was long the President of the 
Trustees of the New Hampshire Insane 
Asylum, making his office no sinecure, but 
maintaining frequent intercourse with the 
officers in charge of the institution, often 
visiting the inmates and ascertaining their 
condition by personal inspection, and regard- 
ing the trust as second to none in its sacred- 
ness, and in its demands on his best thought 
and most faithful industry. He was for 
thirty-two years one of the Trustees of 
Phillips Exeter Academy, and for nearly all 
that time President of the Board; and in this 
capacity he contributed greatly to the pru- 
dent management of the funds of the institu- 



3o 

tion, the enlargement of the privileges it 
offers, and the enhancement of its reputation 
as second to no similar seminary of learning 
in the country. 

It may well be supposed that so various 
employments and trusts, together with the 
engrossing demands of his profession, gave 
Dr. Burroughs little room for activity beyond 
his own State; and his most busy years were 
during the period when Portsmouth was a 
weary day's journe}^ from Boston, and was 
itself the centre of a large circumference, 
instead of being through the agency of steam 
almost a suburb of the metropolis of New 
England. Except in the general administra- 
tion of his own Church, and among a cher- 
ished circle of friends in his native city, he 
was much less known than a man of so large 
a local reputation and influence would be at 
the present day. His merits were, however, 
by no means unrecognized beyond his im- 



3i 

mediate sphere. He was early chosen an 
honorary member of the Massachusetts His- 
torical Society, and read in Boston, at the 
invitation of that Society, three lectures on 
the life of Sir William Pepperell, which 
have hardly ever been surpassed in fidelity 
and minuteness of historical research. In 
1833 he received the degree of Doctor of 
Divinity from Columbia College, an institu- 
tion with which he had no personal relations, 
and which can have been led thus to honor 
him only by his general reputation as a 
scholar and a theologian. 

Dr. Burroughs performed in the latter 
years of his life a service which will insure 
for him an enduring name among our public 
benefactors. Deeply impressed with the 
poverty of our best libraries in religious lit- 
erature, and with the scanty means of theo- 
logical research in private collections, he 
conceived the idea of establishing a library 



32 

devoted to that department alone. His 
plan had the broadest possible scope, com- 
prehending not only editions of the Script- 
ures, Biblical works, and standard theological 
writings, but books by and concerning all 
Christian and pseudo-Christian sects, works 
relating to the ethnic religions ancient and 
modern, and even the entire literature of 
scepticism and infidelity, which the Christian 
scholar has no right to ignore. The result 
of this plan was the General Theological 
Library in Boston, already comprising sev- 
eral thousands of volumes, rapidly increas- 
ing, and opened on such liberal terms that 
none who need its benefits can be debarred 
from its use. This institution, whose exist- 
ence is due solely to his efforts, whose af- 
fairs were wisely and prosperously initiated 
and conducted under his presidency, and 
which he generously endowed with books 
and money during his lifetime, was also lib- 



33 

erally remembered in the testamentary dis- 
position of his property. 

We regret that we have not been able to 
obtain a list of Dr. Burroughs's publications. 
We believe that he issued from the press 
but one printed volume entirely his own. 
This is entitled " The Poetry of Religion, 
and Other Poems," and bears the date of 
185 1. It is a series of poems rich in devout 
sentiment, and indicating an easy command 
of poetic imagery and rhythmical diction. 
He, however, though he often wrote in 
verse for his own solace and recreation, or 
on occasions of interest to his friends, was 
by no means vain of his poetic gifts; and 
this little volume was not offered to the pub- 
lic, but printed only for private circulation. 
His published sermons and addresses were 
numerous, always appropriate, written with 
great care, and not unfrequently the result 
of very extensive and elaborate research. 



34 

On the completion of a new almshouse in 
Portsmouth, he was invited to deliver a dis- 
course at the dedication of the chapel; and 
we doubt whether so much of the history 
of pauperism is anywhere to be found within 
the same space, as in this discourse as 
printed. Similarly rich as historical docu- 
ments were several occasional sermons — 
some of them printed — on epochs of pecu- 
liar interest to his own parish, especially one 
delivered at the consecration of the church 
edifice, — a ceremony performed according 
to the prescribed ritual, after extensive re- 
pairs, in 1848, forty years after its non-epis- 
copal dedication. He published also an 
admirable sermon, delivered in St. Paul's 
Church, New York, at an anniversary of the 
Sunday School Union of the Protestant 
Episcopal Church. He preached at the 
funeral of his friend Rev. Dr. Morss, of 
Newburyport; and the sermon, containing 



35 

a vivid portraiture and fervent eulogy of 
an excellent man, was published. He de- 
livered and published, also, an oration on 
the centennial anniversary of Washington's 
birthday, which is a discriminating sketch of 
the character and services of the Father of 
his Country. One of Dr. Burroughs's earlier 
literary labors was occasioned by a sad 
event that occurred in the Portsmouth 
harbor in 1825. Two young men, teachers, 
were drowned on a pleasure excursion. One 
of them, Morse, left numerous papers, which 
indicated equally high literary promise and 
profound devotional feeling. These papers 
Dr. Burroughs prepared for the press in a 
small duodecimo volume, with an apprecia- 
tive memoir of the writer and his friend. 
We regret that we are unable to give a fuller 
catalogue of publications which appeared 
at intervals through many years, but of 
which we cannot learn that any collec- 



36 

tion was ever made. In addition to these 
separate publications, Dr. Burroughs was 
a frequent and valued contributor to the 
K Portsmouth Journal/' and other periodicals 
of the day. 

After Dr. Burroughs's resignation of his 
parochial charge, he virtually retained it for 
a large number of his flock, who still looked 
to him as their pastor in all important emer- 
gencies; and at the same time he busied 
himself in those modes of general useful- 
ness which he who wishes to do good always 
finds open to him. On Sundays he com- 
monly preached either at the Navy Yard, or 
at some church in Portsmouth or its vicinity. 
Always an ardent patriot, on the breaking 
out of the Rebellion he entered warmly into 
the national cause, spoke in its behalf with 
great vigor and eloquence at several public 
meetings, and contributed largely in both 
money and influence to the various move- 



37 

ments in providing for the public defence 
and in meeting the needs of the army, and 
the claims of humanity in behalf of the 
wounded and suffering. 

For several winters Dr. and Mrs. Bur- 
roughs exchanged their home for lodgings 
in Boston, where he enjoyed the society of 
many friends as well new as old. The win- 
ter of 1866-67 was thus spent; and though 
those who saw him frequently witnessed no 
failure of mental activity, nor even a dimin- 
ished fluency or sprightliness in conversa- 
tion, still his look and manner betokened 
declining strength, and he found himself 
unequal to some of his wonted pursuits and 
recreations. He returned to Portsmouth in 
the early spring. During the summer he 
was feeble and easily wearied, yet with no 
symptoms other than those of senile infirm- 
ity. In the autumn bronchial disease was 
full}' developed, and, though relieved at times 



38 



by palliatives, it was soon perceived to be 
incurable. As winter approached, it became 
certain that a fatal change could not be long 
delayed. He had at times very severe suf- 
fering, and was seldom free from labored 
respiration and a racking cough. His mind 
remained clear and firm, his patience was 
uninterrupted, and his cheerfulness unim- 
paired. Able to converse only at rare inter- 
vals and with difficulty, he yet sustained the 
spirits of those around him, instead of need- 
ing their support. He knew how rapidly 
he was approaching the close of life; but he 
had long before overcome the fear of death, 
and his only utterances with regard to it 
were those of assured faith, hope clear as 
sight, and solemn joy. A short time before 
his decease he enjoyed the comfort of a visit 
from Bishop Eastburn of Massachusetts (to 
whose diocese he had transferred his eccle- 
siastical relations), who administered to him 



39 

the Holy Communion, — a season so se- 
renely happy that those who partook with 
him of the feast of love felt that he in spirit 
was already on the other side of the death- 
river. After this he waited a few days, with 
ebbing strength, yet without severe parox- 
ysms of disease, and passed into immortality 
on the 5th of March, 1868. The funeral 
services were held at Trinity Church, Bos- 
ton, and were conducted by Bishop East- 
burn, who delivered an appropriate address 
on the occasion. A large number of friends 
who loved and honored him then followed 
the body to its final rest at Mount Auburn. 



Cambridge : Press of John Wilson & Son. 



